Surprising Findings from First Midsize Company Strategy Summit

Top executives from a dozen midsize companies, together with a select group of Oracle partners, gathered at Oracle headquarters in Redwood Shores, California, October 10-11, 2007, to help shape Oracle's long-term strategy for midsize companies, with some surprising results.

The Midsize Company Strategy Council was formed to help identify real-world customer challenges and prioritize Oracle investments to provide targeted, value-add solutions. In particular, sessions addressed Applications Unlimited, Application Integration Architecture (AIA), On Demand, and next-generation applications.

"In addition," says Ron Berry, Oracle's director of applications strategy for midsize companies," the council's October meeting yielded a number of unexpected findings. And that, of course, is exactly what we wanted—to hear customer's real concerns so we can target our resources accordingly."

ROI > TCO
According to Berry, participants revealed again and again that they're more concerned with return on investment—the ability to get systems up, running, and delivering measurable results as quickly as possible—rather than simply minimizing costs.

Berry said customers were also eager to discover ways of leveraging current Oracle investments to best take advantage of new functionality available in the wake of Oracle's major recent acquisitions.

At the same time, to justify this more aggressive approach, customers said they needed more comprehensive tools to calculate ROI, which Berry said is certain to receive renewed focus from Oracle.

Next Up: BI, SaaS
Council members also made clear their increasing desire for more comprehensive business intelligence. In response, Berry said Oracle will re-evaluate current offerings, including pricing, to devise ways to bring pervasive BI—including both the BI backbone and vertical content—within reach of midsize companies.

The council was also interested in on-demand solutions, including Oracle On Demand, as a way to make IT costs predictable without forgoing enterprise-level technologies.

Finally, council members also expressed a clear need for more community with other midsize Oracle customers in order to capture and share best practices.

Going forward, council meetings—which are slated to take place quarterly—will likely focus in on fewer topics in order to hone in on a few key areas, according to Berry. They'll also include more interactive breakout sessions, which Berry said were some of the most lively and productive parts of October's meeting.